Meta funds skilled trades jobs program for AI data center buildout

Meta is investing $115 million to stand up a new training program for data center technician jobs, as the social media giant races to ​build the infrastructure to power its AI ambitions.

The cost-free program, America’s Workforce Academy, ‌will end in guaranteed job offers to graduates, the company said in a statement.

A Meta spokesperson said the program will provide generalist training for data center technicians. Jobs on offer will be full-time roles ​with general contractors working on Meta’s data center buildout, she added.

The spokesperson declined ​to specify how many positions would be available, with which firms and ⁠whether they would be union jobs.

The Associated Builders and Contractors, a construction trade group, ​said it expects to train thousands of people over the course of the program.

“The AI ​revolution is bringing change but also historic opportunities,” said Dina Powell McCormick, Meta president and vice-chairman.

The investment is a tiny slice of the $600 billion total Meta has pledged to invest in U.S. infrastructure and jobs ​over the next three years, as it builds out massive data centers to power CEO ​Mark Zuckerberg’s aggressive bets on AI agent technologies.

Zuckerberg has said his goal is to build AI assistants that ‌can ⁠take action autonomously on their users’ behalf to create apps, book appointments and complete transactions.

He embarked on a big-ticket hiring spree last year to enable that vision for “personal superintelligence,” offering $100 million signing bonuses to AI researchers from rival firms like OpenAI.

More recently, he has been ​carrying out an AI-related restructuring ​inside Meta, laying ⁠off 10% of the workforce, or about 8,000 employees, and reassigning nearly as many others to new units aimed at improving the ​company’s AI models and tools.

In general, data centers tend to produce, short-term ​construction booms and ⁠a small number of permanent jobs.

For instance, a data center in Texas where Meta broke ground last year – one of the largest planned in the US – is projected to have more than ⁠1,800 ​workers onsite at peak construction but to create about ​100 jobs once operational.

Another Meta data center in Oklahoma is expected to create more than 1,000 construction jobs at its ​peak and about 100 operational jobs upon completion. Reuters